In June, Espolon Tequila gathered 11 likeminded and creative bartenders together in Hobart to attend Dark Mofo, the winter festival of arts and culture known for being a little subversive and provocative. They discussed creativity, swapped ideas, and found inspiration in the depths of winter — and now they’re sharing what they found with bartenders in their cities.

Georgia Gresham is the talented Brisbane bartender who been behind some of that city's best tasting drinks over the last couple of years, and who you’ll find behind the stick at Dark Red in Fortitude Valley. Below, Georgia talks about how the trip to Dark Mofo inspired a range of emotions, the creative process, and loads more.

BOOTHBY: Let’s start with your drink. What’s the name of your drink and what inspired it?

GEORGIA GRESHAM: The inspiration behind my drink is very much based on the way that Dark Mofo made me feel. Less so about the surroundings, more so internal — I guess you’d say trauma almost.

It was a very dark space to begin with, crosses hanging upside down, the red, the almost internal disgust at myself, religion. It was a mix of everything. There was a lot going on. It was a lot of feelings — to have grown up in a Christian household, and going into an environment which is diverse and so sinful. Especially with the crosses hanging upside down, it was a big thing for me. I was like, I shouldn’t be here. So it was a very, very different frame of mind to be in and a very interesting place to experience so much art and culture in a way that I haven’t previously seen it.

Well, no-one has answered that question quite like that. So how does that experience translate into the drink that you’ve made?

I’ve gone with the darker theme, which makes sense. The drink itself is made with apple, you’ve got a toasted apple, pepper, leatherwood honey syrup in there. That is relating to the original sin, the apple that Eve ate, linking back to Christianity there, which was a bit fun. The pepper just gives it a bit more spice to it. The leatherwood honey is obviously Tasmanian. I needed to pull that all together and give it a flavour of Tasmania.

Then you have a beetroot kombucha. We were given a great little rundown of how fermentation and controlled decay would help in drink making, and one of the things we’ve spoken about was kombucha. I thought it would be really fun to use that. Obviously the controlled decay is a big, dark theme, and to link it back to death and the afterlife — that was really fun to play around with. The beetroot, obviously, it’s underground so we can link that one back, and it ties into the roots of the drink — because the drink is called Sinner’s Roots.

Do you think of yourself as a creative person?

Do I think of myself as a creative person? Yes I do. I am a little bit creative, at least a little bit. I think I’ve always been that way. It’s always been part of me that I’ve held up and used obsessively forever. I’ve been using my creativity in a million different ways.

What are some of the ways you use your creativity that are outside the drink making realm? Is it useful in creating an experience for guests?

Yeah, big time for a creative experience for guests. So you need to be very out there with your creativity for that. The guests come in, and what you’re really selling them is the experience. You want them to experience something new, something different.

I love drinking a drink that I feel has a meaning. So I think tying that into the experience and bringing creativity into that is a really fun way to engage guests. And being excited about it yourself, just being excited about your own creativity in this space and what you’ve done and bringing that to life to the guests is a really fun way to engage them.

It’s rewarding as well.

Yeah, it is. It’s awesome. You get to see them be excited with you and it’s fun.

Where do you find inspiration?

Inspiration is everywhere. This drink, it’s very straightforward. It was Dark Mofo. We had a lot of inspiration there. It was packed into a short amount of time. It was a lot going on. It was very inspiring. Art is always inspiring. That was beautiful to have that brought to life for us to create a drink for it.

Other than that, inspiration is literally everywhere. I think Instagram Reels really brings out a lot of creativity in me in a fun way. You scroll through and you see all of these restaurants and people doing crazy stuff, with different foods and different things and you’re like, I kind want to put that on a drink. And it’s really fun to bring that to life as well. Just life. I think people are inspiring.

Georgia Gresham’s Sinners Roots recipe

• 30ml fennel seed–infused Espolon Reposado
• 30ml beetroot barley tea kombucha
• 10ml peppered apple leatherwood honey syrup

Build: Carbonated
Glassware: Black-stemmed glass
Garnish: Beetroot-apple candy